Unlike the first Nintendo Switch, Switch 2 supports microSD Express cards. The move from Nintendo is helping popularise the standard that was created in 2019, but has not picked up enough steam.

So far, non-Express microSD cards have done the task, but speed has been an issue. Nintendo's console required performance closer to that of an internal SSD to run games.

The Verge reports that a Chinese company called Biwin has developed the ‘Mini SSD’, a 15-by-17 mm-thick card that supports read speeds of up to 3,700MB per second due to a two-lane PCI Express 4.0 interface. The current microSD Express standard can support roughly the same peak speeds when connected to two PCIe 4.0 lanes.

A 2023 analysis from TechSpot suggested that game size had increased at an average rate of roughly 6.3GB per year between 2012 and 2023. The increase in size could be because of better graphics and the higher-resolution textures needed to make games look good on 4K monitors and TVs. Biwin offers 512GB, 1TB, and 2TB capacities.

Mathures Paul